Mullenix v. Luna

What Happened

On March 23, 2010, Sergeant Baker of the Tulia, Texas Police tried to serve an arrest warrant on Israel Leija, Jr. at a drive-in restaurant. Leija sped off onto Interstate 27, leading officers on an 18-minute chase at speeds between 85 and 110 miles per hour. During the chase, Leija twice called the police dispatcher, claiming to have a gun and threatening to shoot any officer who didn’t abandon the pursuit. The dispatcher relayed these threats to all officers.

Law enforcement set up tire spikes at three locations along the highway. Texas DPS Trooper Chadrin Mullenix drove to a Cemetery Road overpass, initially planning to set up a spike strip. But he began considering a different tactic: shooting at Leija’s car to disable it. Mullenix had no training in this technique and had never tried it. He radioed his plan and asked his supervisor, Sergeant Byrd, what he thought. Before receiving Byrd’s response — “stand by” and “see if the spikes work first” — Mullenix took up a shooting position on the overpass, 20 feet above the highway.

When Leija’s car approached three minutes later, Mullenix fired six shots. The car continued beneath the overpass, hit the spike strip, struck the median, and rolled two and a half times. Leija was killed by Mullenix’s shots — four struck his upper body. None hit the car’s engine block. After the shooting, Mullenix’s first words to Sergeant Byrd were: “How’s that for proactive?”

What the Court Decided

The Supreme Court reversed the Fifth Circuit in a per curiam opinion, granting Mullenix qualified immunity. The Court held that the Fifth Circuit had defined clearly established law at too high a level of generality — stating only that officers may not “use deadly force against a fleeing felon who does not pose a sufficient threat of harm to the officer or others.”

The Court applied its standard approach: “We do not require a case directly on point, but existing precedent must have placed the statutory or constitutional question beyond debate.” The dispositive question was “whether the violative nature of particular conduct is clearly established,” not whether a general principle covers it.

Looking at the specific circumstances — a reportedly intoxicated fugitive, traveling over 100 mph, who had twice threatened to shoot officers, racing toward an officer manning a spike strip — the Court found no precedent clearly establishing that Mullenix acted unreasonably. The Court did not decide whether there was a Fourth Amendment violation, only that any such violation was not clearly established.

Justice Sotomayor dissented, arguing that Mullenix fired without any training, against his supervisor’s express order, less than a second before the car would have hit spike strips already in place. She accused the Court of “sanctioning a ‘shoot first, think later’ approach to policing.”

What It Means in Practice

Mullenix is the defense bar’s favorite qualified immunity case. It dramatically raised the bar for what counts as “clearly established law” in excessive force cases. After Mullenix, plaintiffs must identify precedent with closely analogous facts — general principles like “deadly force requires a sufficient threat” are not enough.

For § 1983 plaintiffs, this means:

• You need case law involving facts substantially similar to yours — not just the same legal rule
• The more “hazy” the border between acceptable and excessive force in your fact pattern, the more likely QI will be granted
• Courts will examine the totality of the specific circumstances the officer confronted, not abstract principles
• Even reckless conduct (no training, disobeying a supervisor) can be shielded if no prior case addressed that exact scenario

How You Can Use It

Despite being a defense case, Mullenix contains language useful to plaintiffs:

• “Plainly incompetent” standard: The Court reaffirmed that QI protects “all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.” Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986). If your officer’s conduct was plainly incompetent, Mullenix supports you.
• Distinguish your facts: Mullenix involved a high-speed chase with verbal death threats — extreme circumstances. If your case involves a calmer setting, distinguish it.
• Template: “Unlike in Mullenix v. Luna, 577 U.S. 7 (2015), where the officer confronted a reportedly intoxicated fugitive who had twice threatened to shoot police, here [describe calmer/less threatening circumstances]. The clearly established law prohibition against [specific conduct] applies with full force.”
• Cite for the standard itself: Mullenix restates the QI framework concisely. Even when arguing against QI, you can cite Mullenix for the proposition that existing precedent need not be “directly on point” — it need only place the question “beyond debate.”

How It Can Be Used Against You

Mullenix is the most commonly cited case by defense counsel seeking qualified immunity in excessive force cases:

• Specificity requirement: Defense will argue that no prior case involved facts sufficiently similar to yours, making the law not “clearly established” for your officer’s particular conduct.
• “Hazy border”: Defense will invoke Mullenix’s holding that QI protects actions in the “hazy border between excessive and acceptable force.” Any ambiguity in your facts works in the officer’s favor.
• Alternative tactics: Mullenix rejected the argument that officers must try less-lethal alternatives first — “[t]he dissent can cite no case from this Court denying qualified immunity because officers entitled to terminate a high-speed chase selected one dangerous alternative over another.”

How to counter: Find factually analogous precedent — from the Fifth Circuit, Supreme Court, or a “robust consensus of persuasive authority” from other circuits. If the conduct is truly egregious, argue the “obvious case” exception recognized in Hope v. Pelzer and applied by the Fifth Circuit in Cole v. Carson. The en banc Cole decision shows that Mullenix does not foreclose QI denials in obvious cases.